Sunday, October 26. 2008
The New York Times has an editorial about North Caroline's confusing straight ticket voting law today: NY Times October 27, 2008 Editorial This Year’s Butterfly Ballot
In Florida’s “butterfly ballot” debacle of 2000, voters in Palm Beach County were so confused by the odd layout that many appear to have voted for the wrong candidate by mistake. At the time, there was a lot of talk about improving ballot design. Eight years later there are still far too many badly done ballots. North Carolina may have the country’s worst. It is already causing confusion with early voters. And if the presidential race is close, it could change the outcome.
Like a number of states, North Carolina allows its voters to choose a straight-party ticket. To do that, voters can mark one box and cast votes for all of the nominees of their preferred party. But North Carolina’s ballot has an unexpected twist. Even if a voter checks the straight-party box, he or she must vote separately for a presidential candidate.
...more at the link
North Carolina, October 27. 2008 NCVVNewswire/NC Coalition for Verified Voting
The State Board of Elections has responded to national concerns about NC's straight ticket voting problem by sending an advisory to all 100 County Boards of Elections. The email was sent Wednesday, at 5 PM 10/22. The email urges all County Board of Elections to have poll workers give handouts about straight ticket voting to all voters showing up to vote. It is not clear that all counties are complying.
Some North Carolina Counties are choosing not to comply with this directive. And the voters will suffer as a result. It is important that every single county, every single polling place - in early voting and on election day in North Carolina comply.
In North Carolina, straight ticket voting does not count for President. Many voters do not realize this and as a result, our state has one of the highestundervote rates for President in the US. In 2004 we lost 92000 votes for President, and in 2000 we lost 75,000 votes for Presidentbecause of this counter-intuitive law. See NC Voters' page on Straight Ticket Confusion
Below is the email sent to all counties, are they all complying? From: Johnnie McLean [mailto:Johnnie.McLean@ncmail.net] Sent: Wednesday, October 22, 2008 5:07 PMTo: Directors.boeCc: ElectTechs.Sboe;
Subject: IMPORTANT INFORMATION In order to ensure that all voters receive the information about President/Vice President being voted separately from all other offices you are directed to reproduce the following message (printed four to a page to be cut) and hand/mail to each voter when the ballot/voting equipment is assigned to the voter. Any color paper may be used to duplicate this information. This measure is in addition to the verbal instructions the pollworkers are to provide
****************************************************************************************************************NOTICE: E-mail correspondence to and from this address may be subject to the North Carolina Public Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties by an authorized state official.
***************************************************************************************************************
E-mail correspondence to and from this address may be subject to the North Carolina Public Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties by anauthorized county official. If you have received this communication in error , please do not distribute it. Please notify the sender by E-mail at the address shown and delete the original message. [Attachment]
PLEASE NOTE:
A "straight party" vote does not include the office of president or
any nonpartisan race or issue. You must vote for president/vice
president separately from the other offices. Nonpartisan offices
and issues also must be voted separately. More detailed instructions are
on your ballot. For paper ballots, be sure to turn the ballot over.
#
Background information
North Carolina Straight Ticket Confusion - Voting Straight Ticket in North Carolina does NOT include the Presidential contest. NC Coalition for Verified Voting 10/17/08
How Bad is North Carolina’s Ballot Flaw? The Numbers Say, Pretty Bad By Lawrence Norden & Margeret Chen, Brennan Center for Justice 10/21/08
It May Be Harder to Vote in Swing States By: David Rosenfeld Miller-McCune 10/22/08
Tuesday, September 30. 2008
Rady Ananda has posted a review of The Clint Curtis Story over at OpEdNews that has me heading right over to Link TV to watch it. It has appearances by Attorney Bob Fitrakis, computer security expert Harri Hursti, Gore Vidal, Mavis Georgalis, Cynthia McKinney, and Richard Hayes Phillips. Read Rady's view over at OpEdNews and you'll want to watch this movie. I saw Clint in the movie Uncounted, so I know I want to see this movie. Clint Curtis is a fascinating and compelling figure in the e-voting movement, a computer programmer, hired to develop some vote switching source code. He is notable chiefly for making a series of "whistleblower" allegations about his former employer and about Republican Congressman Tom Feeney, including an allegation that in 2000, Feeney and Yang Enterprises requested Curtis's assistance in a scheme to steal votes by inserting fraudulent code into touch screen voting systems. Read the review and you'll want to see the movie. Murder, Spies & Voting Lies: The Clint Curtis Story WARNING: Graphic images included. Released on DVD and now airing on Link TV, Murder, Spies & Voting Lies: The Clint Curtis Story, is the most explosive documentary produced in recent memory, involving murder, espionage, coverup, electoral cyber fraud and a United States Member of Congress with ties to the Bush Administration.... more at the link
Friday, September 19. 2008
Silence is not golden when it a federal agency knows but says nothing about voting machine failures. The GAO reports that at least ten swing states will be using voting machines and electronic poll books with known defects in their systems. The ten states known to be affected are Colorado, Missouri, New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Virginia and Wisconsin. These defects could skew the vote or disenfranchise voters. The defects silence on the part of the EAC is disturbing. The Elections Assistance Commission knew but said nothing. Friday, Sep 19, 2008 A Government Accountability Office report on voting system testing shows many of the problems that plagued the last election still exist. And Missouri is one of the states with remaining problems.
CNN reports a study by Common Cause and the Century Foundation indicates that ten vital swing states have significant voting glitches that have not been addressed.
It also shows that the Election Assistance Commission has failed to inform election officials around the country about electronic voting machine shortcomings....
Thursday, September 18. 2008
Florida is at it again, not ashamed to knowingly throw people's votes away. No Match? No Vote! Typos to keep voters off the rolls Who needs voter caging when you have a legal way to block the vote? In the 11th hour before registration windows close, Florida is again enforcing a arbitrary state law that will disenfranchise thousands. At issue - the state's law that requires a voters personal voter registration information to match up with the state Dept of Motor Vehicles and or the Social Security Dept's database. The problem - many voters do not match, through no fault of their own. Something as small as a clerk's typo, another voter with same last 4 digits of social security number, or a different way of writing the name - could keep voters off the rolls. Election supervisors are supposed to try to contact voters when this happens, but this is the busiest time of the year and they would have thousands of voters to contact. Florida is one of about 5 states that has mis interpreted the "Help America Vote Act" to mean "Block Vulnerable Floridians From Voting Act". VOTER REGISTRATION 'No match, no vote' law to be enforced A controversial voter registration law that requires Floridians to have their identification match up with a state or federal database will be enforced. Posted on Tue, Sep. 09, 2008 ...Secretary of State Kurt Browning sent notice to the state's 67 supervisors of elections on Friday that the 2006 law, which has been on hold for the last year pending court rulings, would take effect again Sept. 8. The result is that voters whose identification doesn't match with state files on Election Day will be given a provisional ballot and two days to prove their identity for their ballot to count.
Crist defends the indefensible: Crist defends "no match, no vote law", voters leader disagrees By Bill Cotterell • Florida Capital Bureau • September 18, 2008 the head of the League of Women Voters of Florida said the new requirement will disenfranchise thousands of legitimate voters. Leon County Elections Supervisor Ion Sancho called it a "partisan manipulation of the process," aimed at reducing the impact of new voters registered this month, and League President Marilynn Wills said it will place an "onerous" burden on inexperienced voters... Many will fail to match through no fault of their own. In fact, state election officials in Wisconsin tested out the "no match no vote" rule on their own registrations. Four of its six members' names failed to check when the members' names were run through new voter identification system as a test. (for a match). More than half of the state Government Accountability Board's members failed when their names were run through new voter identification checks as a test.
Wednesday, September 17. 2008
Still developing! Here's an update on the report about mailers that are confusing voters in Florida. Sasha of the "Sound Off with Sasha" radio show interviewed journalist David Rosenfeld, of Miller-McCune about mass mailers the McCain campaign was sending to Florida Democrats. On top of being from the wrong party, the voters also happen to be "snow birds". The concerns were that this was a caging effort, something Floridians are quite familiar with. If it wasn't a caging effort, then the worry was that the mailers would disenfranchise voters some other way. **An additional update**The St Petersburg Times reports that the McCain campaign has sent mailers targeting elderly democrats, and the mailers create confusion about the voter's registration status.."We have you registered as a Republican..." Here's what we now know: The Florida mailer that David Rosenfeld shared with me is not an absentee ballot application, but a mailer asking voters to change their registration to the GOP party. Its not clear if there are absentee ballot cards being mailed out in Florida by the McCain Campaign. The mailer that David Rosenfeld reported was a form to Florida voters to "verify" your "party affiliation" and to encourage you to re-register as republican if you weren't already. This mailer can't be used for caging purposes because "non profit" postage is used. Non profit postage won't cover the costs of returning the mailer to the sender, which is the GOP. (It takes first class postage to get mailers returned). If the voter is out of town, or if the voter has moved, it still won't matter, because the mailer won't be returned to the sender. The Florida activists checked with the USPS and were told that this type of mail, if not deliverable, is trashed. Pam advises that:
"In the meantime, we need to tell voters—especially those registered 9/8 or later-- to check and double check their voter’s registrations with their county elections office to be sure they are good to go for November." Late evening addition: "We have you registered as a Republican.." TALLAHASSEE — A new pitch for John McCain's presidential campaign aimed at older Democratic voters is causing complaints by Democrats and concern by elections officials. The piece, paid for by the Republican National Committee and authorized by McCain, tells voters it is seeking to double-check their "unconfirmed" party affiliations while asking for money. A letter signed by McCain tells the Democrats: "We have you registered as a Republican." ...Two top Florida elections officials, both Republicans, faulted the GOP mailing, calling it "confusing" and "unfortunate" because of a potential to undermine voter confidence by making them question the accuracy of their registrations. "It is unfortunate, because it does put a lot of doubt in people's minds," said Secretary of State Kurt Browning, the state's top elections official. After his office received dozens of calls, Duval County Supervisor of Elections Jerry Holland issued a media alert that his office had nothing to do with it. "They were upset folks and they were very concerned," said Holland, a Republican. "They mainly said their party (listing) was different than it was." ...The letter asks recipients to note changes on an "RNC File Card" and return it to the party by Sept. 26. The card shows a nine-digit "voter ID" number, but the supervisor of elections in Jacksonville's Duval County said the numbers are wrong and do not match the state's voter database....
Sunday, September 14. 2008
This email from the Secretary of State of Washington outlines another bug in the new IRV voting system for Pierce County. It affects "rank choice voting" (IRV/Instant Runoff) only. Pierce County Washington adopted "instant runoff voting" in November 2006. In May 2008, officials were backed into a corner and ended up getting permission to use uncertified IRV software, violating their own state's laws.
Pierce county has Sequoia "Insight" optical scanners and DREs. The tabulating software, WinEDS 4.0.34 is still under test by iBeta. There is not even a test plan presented to the EAC for this system at this time. Washington State provisionally certified this software for use even after finding that there were problems with the use of the Insight machines when used in the RCV process. San Francisco is also using this system, and currently it is not certified in California to count IRV. San Francisco officials still don't know how they will count their "ranked choice" voting in November 2008.
Here's the email (Thanks to John Gideon of www.VotersUnite.org for sharing)
Dear Team,
It has come to our attention that there is a very rare occurrence of a problem with the Rank Choice Voting results loading with Pierce County’s provisionally certified software.
Continue reading "Pierce County Instant Runoff Voting System has new bug, says WA SOS - may affect San Francisco"
Thursday, September 11. 2008
D.C. Election Glitch Blamed On Equipment
Washington Post
D.C. election officials blamed a defective computer memory cartridge yesterday for producing what appeared to be thousands of write-in votes that officials say did not exist. Ah, the return of the "glitch".
As I have stated before, "glitch" is a word the press likes to use anytime they discuss computer failures. The word conveys a problem, but doesn't assign blame to anyone. Things just mysteriously happen.
I wonder if they would refer to the collapse of the bridge in Minnesota as the result of a "glitch".
No, of course not. The bridge collapsed because people failed to perform the proper maintenance on it, and allowed serious structural failures to go untreated.
Same with computers. Recovering from a hardware failure is the acid test of a well written program. In this case, the software failed the test, since it allowed phantom votes to register.
"It was determined that one defective cartridge caused vote totals to be duplicated into multiple races on the summary report issued by our office. The Board immediately caught and addressed this error, as is reflected in the last unofficial results report issued on Election Night," Murphy said in the statement. This is the hallmark of bad software. A good programmer anticipates errors, especially hardware failures, they even have a name for it, they call it "error-trapping".
He refused to answer questions from reporters, and no members of the election board appeared. Of course, this assumes that the cause of the problem is being accurately reported to the press, which is a risky bet most of the time, especially since election boards seldom have their own programmers of techs on staff. The usual routine is to repeat whatever the vendor told them happened, and not answer questions which would reveal that they are simply reading lines from a script and have no clue what they are talking about.
I am not the only one who is skeptical.
"That press release is a model of obfuscation," said Henry E. Brady, a professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley who has studied voting systems extensively, including in the deadlocked 2000 presidential contest.
The explanation that a defective cartridge caused tallying errors across multiple races "is what throws me off," Brady said. "It is hard to know what that means. I'm having trouble figuring out how that happens."
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